not a flower
by lokogato-sama
Summary: Companion ficlet to 'the world becamel ight', which explains more about exactly what happened to Duo-chan. Heero sleeps by his lover and dreams. The go off together, all is butterfly husks and tear tracks - WEIRD warning.


Summary: More weirdness, but this time companion weirdness to 'the world became light'. Explications ensue. More 1x2x1.

Disclaimer: Didn't own it then. Haven't managed to acquire it in the time expired between the posting of twbl and now. Alas.

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not a flower

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Heero enters the house and knows immediately something is wrong.

It's too quiet.

He takes a few moments to pinpoint the source of the noise, and there – he's found it. The heater's not running. Duo always turns on the heater before he goes to bed, because he hates waking up cold, and since Heero leaves every morning Duo always wakes up cold.

Always, that word. Heero hates it so much.

Before he even smells the gunpowder, he knows.

He breathes, once – in, hold it, wonder if he has the willpower to stop altogether, out, shoulders slump. Hangs up his coat, lines up his shoes neatly next to Duo's – wonder if Duo will ever find out if Heero does this every day, lines their shoes up neatly so it looks like they belong together, realize he never will – steps into the house.

Kitchen around the corner, five steps forward, two to the right.

He breathes again, in, out, walks, measuring his footsteps – 50.5 centimetres each, 252.5 centimetres to the divisor, 101 centimetres into the kitchen, a total of 3 metres and 53.5 centimetres to where he can see Duo's body, strewn gracefully across the floor.

He takes a moment, notes: the beauty of the arc of neck, the colour of Duo's eyes always near-violet and not quite blue, the perfect curve of an outstretched arm, the inward curve of his back bent at an awkward angle. The bright contrast between drying reddish-brown blood and white skin, the blasphemy of a bullet hole in an otherwise flawless forehead.

Strands of brown hair stuck together with blood, long loose braid tumbling across the floor.

Heero steps over, calm, collected. His hands find the spot in Duo's neck where once he liked to kiss, and suddenly his face is buried there, breath coming harsh and fast, in out in out inout inoutinout. He remembers the slide of his lips against this skin when it was warm and the pulse was erratic.

He pulls back, away. The sacrilege of betraying his lover to his corpse, he wants to laugh, but doesn't. Instead, he pulls the tablecloth off the table, not quite a magician's trick and without the flair, and the dishes crash and tumble, shining chopsticks clattering cleanly on the linoleum.

The body is weightless, as if he is holding a ghost, and he thinks, I'm a necrophiliac, and this corpse is my lover, and he wants to laugh, but again the sacrilege, the word, Catholicism and catharsis and his lover lying dead on the table, and he thinks, I'm glad it's winter and he's wearing black because I don't think I could deal with the settling of blood and blue-black spots along his back.

Rigor mortis has set in, but Heero is strong. Bending Duo's body into a straight line, folding his arms across his ribcage neatly, pushing his head down so he looks like he could be lying in a coffin amongst plush velvet, and Heero has this mental image of himself in a Victorian black ladies' mourning veil and wants to laugh, oh the sacrilege.

Ah, he breathes out, doing something this prostrate body will never do again.

He pulls the chair over, kisses the cold lips even with their splatters of blood – copper metallic the taste of being punched in the stomach and falling in love – and sits down, hands around Duo's, and waits.

-

Heero's first dream.

You are there, the two of you, sitting in a white space that glows everywhere. Duo's got your gun, which is kind of weird since your gun is actually somewhere under the table where it fell.

Duo laughs, echoing weirdly, waves the gun that glints despite the undirected luminescence.

"Je suis mort," He says.

"Tu as," You say, correcting him.

"Non," He says. "Je suis mort."

You nod. "Hai," You say, breaking into Japanese for some reason. "Omae wa shi no kami."

He laughs again, points the gun at you.

"Omae wa korosu," He says. You shake your head.

"Butterflies," You say. "They fly up there."

"Oh, they die so fast," He says, tossing his hair like a girl, and you notice that it is loose. He clicks the catch and pulls the trigger, and a flock of butterflies comes from the muzzle, all colours and beating wings and so many it sounds like a tiny thunderstorm.

"Oh," You say. "I see," And the butterflies start upward and all fall, slow, fast, little dry husky noises as their bodies hit the light at your feet.

"Do you?" He asks, running a hand down his hair. It stretches, lengthens, reaches towards you like a lake or like seeping blood, and you touch it, one strand, silken soft.

"Tu es mort," You say.

"Oui," He laughs, and his hair comes and wraps around you, your legs, arms, head, throat, and as you slowly choke to death you hear him laughing, "Les papillons, c'est vraimant beau, n'est pas, ma cher?"

-

Heero's second dream.

You're in a field of flowers, bright yellow unnamed blossoms, and white petals are floating in the sky, buffeted by a wind you don't feel. The sky is so blue it hurts.

He runs across the field, looking oddly out of place in his old black outfit, stark white square at his throat. He's got a bunch of red roses in his arms; the thorns biting his flesh and making him bleed red as the roses.

"Roses," He says by way of greeting.

"They're very red," You tell him, and he smiles.

"They are," He agrees, showing you how the roses were actually white and they are red because he bled on them. "They're for you."

"Thank you," You say, take the roses and the thorns don't hurt, and you aren't bleeding.

"Aren't you lucky," He comments, sitting in the flowers (they move out of the way) and pulls you down to lean against him. "They don't cut you."

"I'm perfect," You agree. You free a hand from the red flowers and begin to rip up yellow ones, sticking them haphazardly into his braid. He laughs, swatting your hand.

"Don't be silly," He says, and you nod. "I'm leaving now," He says, and stands abruptly, almost making you fall over. Looking up, you see him clear against the blue blue sky and realize there is no sun, and he is emitting light into the world, and bleeding every colour you see:

Yellow

Green

Blue

White

Red

His eyes are violet here against the rose petals he puts on your eyes.

"Goodbye, my love," He says, closing your eyes, and when you open them he's going, only a trace of glow left behind. It is only when everything is black that you realize the thorns are in your arms and you are bleeding.

-

Heero's third dream.

There is wailing in your ears and the scene fills in like an artist's sketch: rough outlines and slow details, and finally grey colour, soaking into the scene.

Ah, the battleground of the world. Dead and dying, weeping women looking for their men, men that cling to their wives like children, children that sob over charred bodies in the dirt, little bodies impaled on spikes.

Oh, the sacrilege, you think blearily, looking around.

A woman comes up to you and asks, "Have you seen my son? He is this tall," She measures with her hands, "This tall, a little child, dark hair, blue eyes?"

You shake your head, "No," You say. "I'm sorry," But she isn't looking at you, and there is a voice behind you:

"Yes," It's him, "I saw one like that over there," and a hand reaches out from behind you and points off into the distance.

"Thank you," She says, and sets off at a hobbling run towards the direction you pointed. You notice that her foot has a wound in it and is bleeding profusely.

"Hello," He says.

"She's hurt," You comment.

"They all are," He says, and they are, bleeding in stark red against the grey of their skin, and you think you live in greyscale until you turn around to see him.

"Ah," You say, he is dressed in a shining white gown, his eyes are blue stones staring at you, and he is in full blazing glorious colour, holding a scythe in one hand, smiling Death.

"They're all hurt," He says, gesturing with the scythe. The blade cuts your arm and you feel with surprise the sharp stinging very real pain as your blood drips out.

"Why are they looking?" You ask.

"They want their loved ones," He explains.

"But why?" You ask, again.

"They love them," He says simply, turning to another woman looking for another lost child, pointing the same way.

"Are they there?" You ask.

"No," He says, smiling, his hair flies loose in the wind and suddenly you feel it, cold and cutting against your cheek. "But it gives them hope."

"Isn't it cruel," You ask. "Giving them hope where there is none?"

"It's all we can give," He says, and leans forward, bangs brushing your forehead. He kisses you, and you let him. He tastes like violets and metal, nothing like he does in life, warm and pulsing and always something bittersweet in the mix.

"Is it all?" You ask, and there are those butterflies again, death dropping to the ground among the corpses and no one notices, keening and sobbing and not noticing and you want to shake them by the shoulders.

"We have nothing else," He says. "And sometimes they find them."

"But not always," You say.

"No," He says. "We can't guarantee a 100 chance of finding their loved one. Sometimes they find them but it is too late and I've already taken them away."

"Who are you," You ask, and he smiles.

"I thought you'd never asks," And even as he says this he turns away, begins to walk.

"Wait!" You cry. "Tell me, who are you?"

"I love you," He says.

"Why?" You ask.

"I love you," He says, and walks away.

-

Heero's last dream.

You're standing in that white place again, butterfly skeletons strewn about you. He sits there, preening corpses from his hair, and looks at you.

You're both completely naked.

"I love you," He says.

"Why," You ask, again.

"I love you," He says, and stands and begins to walk away, the third time.

"Don't go!" You plead. "Tell me why."

"Come with me," He suggests instead.

"But," You begin, and he laughs, tosses his head, smiles.

"Come with me," He insists. "I love you."

"Oh," You sigh, taking a step after him. "You're impossible."

He laughs again. "_When I say to the moment, 'Stay, thou art so beautiful!' then straightaway mayest I be fettered,_" He quotes, from somewhere.

"Wait," You say, and he is retreating faster. The butterfly corpses come to life, flying behind him trailing bits and pieces of themselves like a glittering dust storm.

"I love you," He repeats. "_Come away, come away, death,_" He begins.

"_And in sad cypress let me be laid._" You quote back at him, and he laughs again.

"You always surprise me," He says, reaching out his hand.

"Take me with you," You beg.

"Are you sure?" He asks, raising one eyebrow and brushing your fingers teasingly, maddeningly.

"Oh, yes," You say. "_My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,_" You continue.

"_O, prepare it!_" He laughs, grasps your wrist. "Are you sure? You can't go back, you know."

"I love you," You say to him, and his expression softens.

"_Not a flower, not a flower sweet, On my black coffin let there be strown,_" He says.

"Yes," You say. "I love you."

"For shame," He says. "It took you so long."

"I killed you," You say. He smiles, feral grin.

"I killed you first," And when you kiss him he tastes like warmth and a _thousand thousand _deaths.

-

When they were found two mornings later, Heero was smiling, and there were tear tracks on his cheeks.

-

owari

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words: 2000

8:06 PM

20-10-04

lokogato enterprises ltd.

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Yup. 2000 words exactly. I scare me. It wasn't intentional, I swear. I didn't mean for an exact double, in fact I had 2045 at first count and then I went back and cut out exactly 45 words. I have issues.

Yes … if that made no sense, go read 'the world becamel ight' (it's spelled with the weird spacing, I fucked up and liked it ;). Well, that might not help much either, but whatever. Just read and review, both if you please. Please!

I love you!

Okay. That was a redundant theme here.

So, like it, hate it, still don't get it, or what? TELL ME! REVIEW! (especially if you never want me to write again!)

Loko

The random quotes are as follows:

"_When I say to the moment …_" – Faust to Mephistopheles, something I stole from Shaman King, actually.

The other quotes are from this song, from Shakespeare's _Twelfth Night_:

_Come away, come away, death,_

_And in sad cypress let me be laid._

_Fly away, fly away, breath;_

_I am slain by a fair cruel maid._

_My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,_

_O, prepare it!_

_My part of death, no one so true_

_Did share it._

_Not a flower, not a flower sweet,_

_On my black coffin let there be strown,_

_Not a friend, not a friend greet_

_My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown._

_A thousand thousand sighs to save,_

_Lay me, O, where _

_Sad true lover never find my grave,_

_To weep there!_

That's all, I think …

REVIEW!!


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